The basic idea of using a drone squad as a screening unit is sound. With the Drone Net VX1-0 available there are few reasons why you would want to do this with shield drones when Gun or Marker drones can fill the role almost as well while being flexible enough to do other things for you.

@Lord_of_OYAP I think that keeping the format of unit article submissions roughly in line with the Fire Warrior one (soon to be updated as Strike Teams) might help with the overall readability of the Academy articles once we have a decent number.

Personally, I've had the best luck plopping two to three drones into a squad of broadsides, interspersing them or flanking the lead broadside. This provides near equal distance for wound allocation, letting you pick and choose which shots are put on which models; saving the tank killer rounds for the shield drones, and soaking the lighter shots with a broadside's 2+. Beyond that, however, I've never had luck running a full drone squad.

Maybe we can think of a fluff reason for modeling drones vertically as if they are going full speed ahead and then will be much more effective at providing intervening cover saves

Drone net I feel hurts shield drones even more. Why take a squad of shields when you can take guns and can jink for a 4+ if the enemy is silly enough to shoot low AP at you? On a somewhat separate note I ran the Piranha Firestorm formation for the first time the other day and small drone unit spam isn't too shabby. It has its flaws regarding not being scoring etc, but mobile mass twin-linked pinning weapons that make your opponent cringe when he wastes turns shooting at them can for sure have their place in a decent list.

Not that i've built a list around this idea, but shield drones with an ethereal makes an excellent roadblock unit for stopping those monstrous creatures that like to get in close with us... I had brought in a missile pod crisis team with 3 markers and 3 shields, and a dreadknight got in close. to keep my objective safe, i joined the ethereal to the crisis team and assaulted with it, counting on the stubborn rule to get me through.

the 3 shield drones helped keep that unit alive through turn 4 and 5, and by preventing it from stomping out my fire warriors, I ended up winning the game.

applying the idea to perhaps an O'Mortal commander who can bounce LOS rolls or weak AP attacks would serve as a great counter-assault unit, Especially with VTR to get them out for another round of shooting, especially in a farsight list, but even at its barebones minimum, it doesnt do half bad in a pinch against those monsters or special characters other armies are so fond of.

With the rise of big models like magnus and other daemon princes, knights, etc. (especially when they can close in quickly , be spammed, or can survive focus fire) having a contingency plan you can fall back on like this might be worth considering. worst case scenario, you can always screen oncoming fire as suggested by the OP.

Speaking of your battle with the Grey Knights player, your opponent was likely not thinking about the crisis suits tar pitting his DreadKnight. You absolutely made the right move, but there's a lot of players (my own group included) that often underestimate how "strong" Tau can be in combat (strong in quotes ).

That being said, dedicating a shield drone squad, or even a commander with shield drone squad to tarpit units is likely not a great choice. That's a lot of points to try and tie up a big ol maybe. Not every army is going to try to get you into combat, and combat in general is pretty bad this edition.

Focus on what did work: the Ethereal. Failure is not an option and the Sense of Calm special rules is what really made that tar pit work. The Dreadknight is only going to be able to remove so many wounds each phase, with or without invuln saves on your part.

In general, Tau Commanders should keep in mind that just because Tau are not good in combat, doesn't mean you always have to avoid it.

I've never had anyone question drone-screening in my games before. In fact it was a tactica article here or somewhere else that suggested Piranha drones be used to this effect, to screen the piranhas in addition to using them to block access points of vehicles while wrecking them.